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Comment on I hereby resignparent

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I am not going to do the wrong thing. Ever.

That's a really strong statement. If you stood up and did the right thing, that's awesome. But if your opinion on every situation 'ever' is that you're not going to do the wrong thing, step back and ask whether things are so simple.

I'm not saying moral absolutes don't exist, but striving toward 'the right thing' is seldom so clear. For instance, you quit on the spot. What about the wonderful engineers who now have to pick up the slack? I'm not saying you made the wrong choice, but there are consequences to be weighed in every situation. If your method of decision-making rests on the idea that you don't have a choice, I think you're limiting yourself.

And finally - I thought a lot about writing this, because I generally hate comments about commenting - you responded to a really interesting post regarding privacy and hiring in an era of easily accessible sensitive personal information to point out how ethical you are - in your words 'not going to do the wrong thing. Ever.' It's not immediately clear why this applies to raganwald's post, except that both involve company bureaucracy and a protagonist resigning.

I won't go as far as to pretend to know what the parent means, but I'm quite sure he didn't mean to say he will know what's Wrong every single time, but that he just can't willfully commit himself to doing something that goes wildly against his morality.

I meant that I won't willfully do the wrong thing.

Doing unskillful things is part of being human.

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